Thursday, March 20, 2008

The "Lost Boys of Sudan" are a group of refugees named after Peter Pan's cadre of orphans who clung together to escape a hostile adult world. Some 23,000 Sudanese boys and some girls were forced by violence from their southern Sudan villages since the mid-1980's. Sudan, which is located in North East Africa, has experienced brutal civil war fueled by religious, ethnic and regional strive.

The current phase of the civil war began in 1983, pitting the main rebel army, the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) and its allies against the government's military and its allies.Since 1983 this warfare has left nearly 4.5 million Sudanese uprooted from their homes.Combatants on all sides have targeted and exploited civilian populations. A 1998 study by the U.S. Committee for Refugees (USCR) estimated that 1.9 million people in southern and central Sudan had died of war-related causes since 1983.Another USCR report pointed out that Sudanese have suffered more war-related deaths during the past years since 1983 than any single population in the world. (Information from the World Refugee Survey 2000)

Fleeing the violence and bloodshed of Sudan's internal conflict, these innocent children experienced mind-numbing horrors and intense hardship. They walked hundreds of miles in search of peace and then spent over nine years in a Kenyan refugee camp. Today 3,400 Lost Boys are already in the United States or on their way here and settling in cities throughout the country.

Most of the Lost Boys are from the Dinka, Nuer and some are from other tribes of Southern Sudan, where hundreds of villages have been burned, livestock stolen and families decimated. The systematic destruction and violence is considered one of the century's most brutal wars. Again and again, civilians have been targeted, their access to food often blocked as part of a military strategy resulting in widespread famine. According to U.S. State Department estimates, the combination of war, famine and disease in southern Sudan has killed more than 2 million people and displaced another 4 million.

As government troops blazed through southern Sudan — reportedly killing the adults and enslaving the girls — scattered groups of suddenly orphaned boys converged and headed toward Ethiopia, where they hoped to find peace and their families again. Trekking hundreds of miles on foot through the hostile East African desert, Miraculously, thousands survived the ordeal of the late 1980's, finding refuge in camps in Ethiopia and Kenya. There, the children - mostly boys - formed their own "family" groups, with older children protecting the younger ones. Relief workers named the children the "Lost Boys" -after Peter Pan's lost boys

The orphaned boys and some girls trekked almost endlessly through sub-Saharan heat and wilderness. Older boys — some just 9 or 10 — looked after the youngest ones and small cliques of boys formed their own family groups. Many children died of starvation, thirst or attack by wild animals. Later, survivors told how they watched vultures feed on the bodies of their dead friends. Their only relief came when Red Cross helicopters dropped them food or water. However, humanitarian groups could do little more to help them because of the raging violence in the region.

The boys walked for roughly two months across Sudan to Ethiopia, where they spent about three years in various refugee camps until being forced away in 1991 by yet more gunfire. Chased by Ethiopian government tanks and armed militia, the boys frantically tried to cross the River Gilo, where thousands drowned, were eaten by crocodiles or shot.

After leaving Ethiopia, those who survived the river crossing walked for more than a year back through Sudan to Kenya, a destination for thousands of African refugees forced out of their homes by war or natural disaster. Emaciated, dehydrated and parentless, only half of the original boys — some 10,000 who survived the journey — arrived at Kakuma Refugee Camp in 1992. The majority of them were between the ages of 8 and 18 (Most of the boys don't know for sure how old they are; aid workers assigned them approximate ages after they arrived in Kenya).

On their two treks, the children covered hundreds of miles and faced gunfire, lion and crocodile attacks, disease, and starvation. They often had to eat leaves, carcasses of dead animals and mud to survive. Many drowned trying to cross dangerous creeks and rivers. Those who survived carry the memories of such tragic deaths.

Many of these young people had previously seen their parents and other family members killed, as they fled for their own lives—some as young as three years old. Today most have no knowledge of where other family members may be or even if they have survived. The other children became their family. Deep down, most know that their parents are dead, among the two million victims of the ongoing civil war. Still, many of the young refugees say they frequently wake up at night in deep distress, haunted by images of death and destruction.

Relief workers from the United Nations and Red Cross scrambled to provide them with shelter, food and medical attention. However, the needs were overwhelming, and many of the "boys" — which is how they, regardless of age, still refer to one another — who are still there continue to suffer from hunger, disease and dehydration. They receive subsistence-level food rations and a gallon of water a day for cleaning, cooking and drinking. Aid organizations, already struggling to help other refugees at Kakuma, can do little more. Some 65,000 refugees from seven African nations reside at the camp. They depend on humanitarian groups for food, water, shelter, medical care and education.

In many ways, life in the camp at Kakuma has been like that in any other African village, with the youth living in clusters that serve a family-like function. It should be noted that most are male, but there is a small number of females. Since they have lived apart from families for most of their lives, the unaccompanied minors and young adults have not taken part in many of the traditional southern Sudanese cultural traditions (e.g., scarification, owning cattle, learning domestic skills from mothers). Education has been an important part of refugee assistance in Kakuma, with more than 30 schools serving more than 33,000 students. Child welfare workers note that the Sudanese youth generally have very high expectations about education, which is seen as a "recovery strategy"-a way to take back control over their lives.

On Arriving to the United StatesIn 1999, the UNHCR the UN Refugee Agency, working with in collaboration with the U.S. Department of State, referred over 3,400 of these youth to the U.S. for resettlement processing.

Prior to coming to the United States reports about these 3,400 were gathered from the settlement workers at Kakuma. These reports on the Sudanese usually noted that they are an extremely resilient group. Many of the males had some knowledge of English or Arabic. For the women, learning English was often cited as the most important need. One Sudanese case manager said that the most important cultural note for the Sudanese is to learn the importance of time in the U.S. (e.g., making and keeping appointments and following schedules). A Nuer source said the Sudanese do not accept the concept of "no." Yet, resettlement staff had noted that the Sudanese do learn about the limits imposed on them "when all efforts at negotiation fail."

Their expectations were high. A Sudanese worker said that the Sudanese youth "are so used to humanitarian aid and the style of relief workers, that they may think everyone in the U.S. will want to help them, too." Employment will be the first priority of the P-2 Sudanese young adults. The unaccompanied minors will receive foster care case management and education services according to state and local regulations.

Resettlement workers suggested that these youth will benefit from training in life skills, and they will need help in setting realistic goals, managing time, making decisions and maintaining a positive attitude. They recommended getting the Sudanese involved in group activities and connected to community resources.

The Lost Boys in Kakuma-Kenya

AfricaFiles InfoServ - Sudan

About my self

My name is Dominic Duddy Mathiang and I live in Syracuse, New York. I moved here from the Sudan in 2004. Before this date, I lived in Kakuma Refugee Camp in Kenya. Currently, I'm working with the Syracuse Clay Cow project as a volunteer.
The Sudan is extremely important to me and I hope to make this website a place where I can share videos, discuss the Sudan, and help others understand my current, Sudanese-American experience. My goal is to post often when I feel there's a need to share information with the world.
Thank you for visiting and please contact me if you'd like any information about what I'm doing in Syracuse.

The dancing begins at 7:25 a.m. as the thump of a drum splits the cool morning air in the Mangalatore camp for the displaced. A bull's horn wails. A swell of song fills the air. Young men run and leap, legs splayed, Jordanesque, heads rising above the hopping, singing, chanting, ululating crowd.Hundreds of Dinka tribesmen and women have gathered at the Duk-Fuel family compound for a traditional dowry celebration. But the occasion is marred by what is missing: There will be no cattle given to the Duk-Fuel family today, historically the central transaction at this ritual.The Duk-Fuels must settle instead for cautious promises. The family whose boy wants to marry a Duk-Fuel girl vows to give plenty of cattle when the four-decade-old war in this, Africa's largest country, someday ends. "We will honor our agreement," the boy's uncle says.For all its joy, the dowry ritual reminds these Dinka families that the war has robbed them of a symbol central to their identity and culture — cattle.Mabil Duk-Fuel sits in the family compound next to his niece Nyandier Duk-Fuel, 17. Joining them are Mabil's brother Mayar and another niece, Agot. Both girls will marry soon, although the next day's dowry ceremony is primarily for Nyandier.The men say the absence of cattle has transformed the dowry process. Negotiations used to be held in which the boy's family agreed to give cows, sometimes as many as 100, to the Dinka girl's relatives; several families would make such overtures toward a single girl, in a process akin to competitive bidding.Nowadays the negotiations are still held, but they are about handshakes and pledges. There is no livestock available to change hands.Holding the ceremony without cattle, Mabil says, reminds Dinkas that they have no property. "You cannot regain your land," he says through an interpreter. "That is the great loss. . .�. We hope our leaders are working hard to get us back our land."Before the war caused institutions to collapse in southern Sudan, the Dinka were not only farmers and cowherds, but also high court judges and civil administrators and doctors. They were the south's richest and proudest tribe.The cow has always been the focus of their culture. Cattle stood at the heart of virtually every important tradition and ceremony in Dinka life. Myths rose up around the animal. The Dinka wrote songs about it. They created dances to honor it.Dinka see the animal as the highest form of wealth. Today some Dinka retain their cattle, but many have lost their herds, which were killed in fighting or abandoned during the rush to camps for the displaced.A Life ShatteredThe Dinka of Mangalatore camp for the displaced have lost all their cattle, a measure of their wealth, to the war. They now have been forced to cultivate the land instead.(By Carol Guzy/The Washington Post)The loss has pierced the Dinka, so much so that they have altered their governing myths. Stories that once celebrated the tribe's greatness — they believed they were a people favored by God — now describe a people full of dismay and self-doubt. One story, about how the Dinka came to love cattle, has been turned into a tale of woe, in which God is punishing the tribe for devoting so much of itself to the animal."They have been shattered," said Francis Deng, a Dinka who is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington. "They see themselves in a negative light for the first time. . .�. You can see how [the war] has torn at their self-confidence, their sense of dignity."War's obvious impact on Sudan has been well-documented. Beginning in 1955, with an 11-year respite, the conflict between the government in the mostly Islamic north and armed groups in the Christian and animist south has left the country without institutions or infrastructure.The vast south, measuring 322,000 square miles, has four miles of paved road. In many areas, 90 percent of the population has no access to health care. The conflict has destroyed so many schools that, in the words of one veteran aid worker, "an entire generation of Sudanese is . . . illiterate."Roughly 500,000 Sudanese refugees have poured into neighboring countries, and thousands of others, especially professionals, have fled to the West. Fighting also has displaced about 4 million people within the country.But the conflict also provides a case study of how war transforms societies in ways both subtle and profound. As the south's largest tribe, the Dinka have been among the most deeply affected.Dinka fighters long made up the core of southern separatist guerrillas and have paid with heavy loss of life; the more numerous noncombatants among the Dinka have seen long-dear traditions and values slip away.In Sudan the chaos of war has led to lost dialects, diluted traditions and shaken beliefs. It has shredded traditional family structure, so that millions of elderly — usually taken care of by their extended family — must fend for themselves.The war's one unexpected benefit is that it has forced more interaction among tribes. In many camps for the displaced, groups of people who traditionally have been among the south's most isolated must now tolerate each other as neighbors."The positive aspect is that the tribal lines are being blurred," said Deng, of the Brookings Institution.In the past, "intertribal marriage, or even marriage with a member of the same tribe from another part of the country, was very difficult. You didn't marry outside the tribe."But perhaps the biggest impact is that many Dinka have no cattle. "They are literally fish out of water," Deng said. "They have been deprived of what has made them productive, healthy, dignified human beings."Life in the CampChildren play on a tank destroyed in battle after the Sudanese People's Liberation Army took the town of Kaya.(By Carol Guzy/The Washington Post)A dirt road slices through the Mangalatore camp near Kajo Keji, about 10 miles north of the Ugandan border. The 14,000 people here live in mud and straw huts surrounded by plots of limp, leaning corn.The camp is virtually all Dinka, with their distinctive appearance — very dark skin, narrow square shoulders, almond-shaped eyes, tribal scars on their foreheads. They tend to be quite tall. Manute Bol, former center for the Washington Bullets, is a Dinka. He stands 7 feet, 7 inches.There is a health center and a primary school, and organizations such as the American Refugee Committee and Norwegian People's Aid make regular food and supply distributions.The residents toil to make life as normal as possible. They have opened kiosks that sell cigarettes, soap, sugar and batteries. Men have opened a bicycle-repair shop under a tree. A woman has set up a clothing store, with turquoise and pink and black-and-white polka-dot dresses hanging on a line of bamboo.The seemingly normal life, however, cannot hide evidence of the Dinkas' upheaval. Many children here have lost both parents. And the camp is filled with elderly couples left without relatives to care for them.In one tiny hut, Beer Lual's flesh and hair are as white as the pile of ashes at his bedside. Most of his teeth are gone. His skin is taut across his chest. His breathing is shallow and wheezy. His limbs, thin as smoke, are limp.Lual, 72, lies on a piece of tarp. His hut, which he shares with his wife, Yar, 60, holds their belongings: half a bag of sorghum, leather sandals, a ragged trench coat, a pair of corduroys, an empty plastic cup, a can stuffed with rags.Lual and his wife did not expect things to turn out this way. They expected to while away their last days in the company of their 10 children, who lived around them in Bor, nearly 200 miles north of here.Before fighting forced him to flee to Mangalatore four years ago, Lual owned hundreds of cattle, raised lots of goats and chickens, caught fish from the lake near his property. He and Yar lived a good life.But war took the lives of their five sons; marriage has separated them from four of their daughters. Their 14-year-old daughter tries in vain to care for them."Nobody takes care of us," Beer Lual said in Dinka through an interpreter. "If my children were alive, I would depend upon them. . . . I thought my children would be around me."Yar Lual digs and scratches in their plot from 6 a.m. to noon daily, trying to grow corn. But drought has snuffed out the crop this year; wind has snapped some of the parched cornstalks in two.Beer Lual rarely eats. That is because he was used to drinking milk regularly, but without cattle, there is no milk. (One aid group provided milk at a feeding center at the camp until last year.)"I try to prepare food for him and myself . . . but he doesn't eat the food," Yar said. "And we don't have money to buy."A Dowry CeremonyDuring a Dinka dowry dance, men try to jump the highest to impress the women and family of the new bride-to-be. But now instead of cattle as dowry, there are only promises.(By Carol Guzy/The Washington Post)Africa's longest civil conflict has taken a dramatic turn in recent months. The Sudanese People's Liberation Army has churned through government-held ground since March, retaking at least nine towns in the south.The rebels are believed to be within 40 miles of Juba, capital of the south, but the government continues to hold the city and refuses to allow anyone to come or go — in effect, making its residents human shields rendering a rebel attack virtually impossible.Nonetheless, "we are in a better position than we have been in the last 14 years," the rebel chairman and commander in chief, John Garang, a Dinka, said in an interview in Nairobi. "Government cannot reverse the trend and regain the initiative. . . . The war is over."On the morning of the dowry ceremony, Garang's words seem far away, as 30 young men run through a field in a line. One carries a multicolored parasol — red, green, yellow and blue. He is a brother of Galuak Gek Kuryom, 25, Nyandier's suitor. Galuak, a distant cousin of Nyandier, is in another town this morning, caring for a sick friend.The celebration roars on without him. In minutes about 100 men, women and children crowd into the Duk-Fuel compound. Someone from Galuak's family plants a flag in front of Nyandier's hut.Another group of about 75 residents from the camp gathers on the fringes, watching quietly. Nyandier and Agot also stand on the fringe. Nyandier wears a splendid yellow dress, a gold stud in her nose, gold and silver earrings, a silver bracelet on her left wrist. Her hair is done up. She carries a black parasol and a white handkerchief.And when it is time, she and Agot point to groups of young men to dance for them. Two or three young men at a time rush to within inches of Nyandier and Agot, and twist, wave, hop, clap, sing and shout. Other teenagers and young men do the same thing to other girls, as scores of attendants dance around a mango tree.Then more than 100 people, including Nyandier and Agot, form a giant circle and dance. The men, voices like a wave, sing. Plumes of dust hug their feet.The dancing will go on for two hours.Across the yard, dowry negotiations are about to begin. Nyandier's relatives sit under a thick-trunked tree across from Galuak's kin. The two sides, about 20 men in all, are quiet.Galuak's kin sit in a tight circle. They engage in polite but intense conversation. They trace numbers into the ground.First: "22."Then: "25."They are deciding how many cows they will promise to Nyandier's family.Finally, one relative addresses the other side. A young man stands between the two groups, repeating what has been said.One of Galuak's uncles: "I want your daughter to be the wife of [Galuak]. Please give this girl to us. Then I'll give you what you want. . . . We are from one family. We have known each other a long time. Let's make an agreement."A few minutes later, Moses Mawan, 50, Galuak's uncle and official representative here: "Before, when we were in Bor, people bought cattle in these situations. . . . Now, none of this exists, only the agreement. But we cannot stop our daughters from getting married."Then one of Nyandier's uncles responds: "We don't have anything to say now. As you know, there's competition. So we have to wait for the other" suitors.Then the groups break up.The nearby dancing wanes. The singing quiets. Agot and Nyandier relax. The sun has grown hot.As relatives and neighbors scatter to their huts, the only sounds heard are the beat of the drum and the soft plaintive moan of the bull's horn.This series of occasional articles will look beyond Africa's wars, disasters and tragedies and chronicle how people on the continent go about their daily lives.